The Cubs offense exploded for 15 runs against the Reds garbage fire of a pitching staff. Anthony Rizzo led the way with five RsBI, including back to back HRs with Kris Bryant in the fourth to put the game truly out of reach. He also got the scoring going in the first with a single punched to left field against the shift that scored two.

Kyle Schwarber managed to get on base twice in this game and avoided setting the all time record for consecutive strikeouts, so thanks, Reds.

Jon Jay had the biggest WPA play of the of the game for either side with a RBI triple in the fourth inning, good for .150 WPA. He's not hitting it out of the park or anything, but he's been quietly really good over the past month or so, and now has a .299/.388/.394 batting line.

Three down:

Quintana didn't have much of a feel for his pitches in this one, but still managed to get through five while somehow giving up only two runs. Luckily the Cubs have Monty around to backstop him.

Quintana also had an ugly-sounding (I was listening on the radio on my way home) bases loaded error in the disastrous second inning, where the Reds should have picked up a lot more than two runs. If Quintana simply took his time to throw home his start might have turned out much more acceptably.

It would be great if they could find a better backup to Pat Hughes. Even Coomer would be better than this awful Bears guy, who seems to have gotten worse each time he subs in. He had like four different home run calls combined into one on Bryant's first home run.

Next up: Luis Castillo (no, not that one) takes on Kyle Hendricks at 7:05 PM CT.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-15-reds-5/feed/1Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (59-54) at Arizona Diamondbacks (64-50)http://www.obstructedview.net/series-preview-chicago-cubs-59-54-at-arizona-diamondbacks-64-50/
http://www.obstructedview.net/series-preview-chicago-cubs-59-54-at-arizona-diamondbacks-64-50/#commentsFri, 11 Aug 2017 05:15:05 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20524
I had been planning to take a long weekend and catch this series in Phoenix. Instead, I ended up shelling out hundreds of dollars to repair rodent damage to my car, and will be watching from home. I feel like I should present the repair bill to the cat.

Injuries, transactions. vengeance pacts, etc.

The Dbacks are down several good pieces, but are still going strong. Robbie Ray is on the concussion DL after being hit in the head by a batted ball a week or so ago. Shelby Miller, object of a trade heist I recently enjoyed, got off to a solid start in his first few weeks before going under the knife for TJS. Shortstops Nick Ahmed and Chris Owings are on the 60-day DL with hand injuries, but replacement Ketel Marte is somehow slugging .500 in place of them anyway.

Theree's one injury in particular that matters for the Cubs, and that is Willson Contreras. There's no official news as I write this but it sounds like he will be out for about a month. At least it's not Victor Caratini getting everyday starts, I guess. Kris Bryant still seems to be bothered by the hand injury he suffered a few weeks ago, and Koji Uehara somehow ended up on the DL without my noticing. Russell is still on the shelf, and the rumblings seem to be that he will take longer than the minumum ten days to make it back.

Pitching matchups

Friday: John Lackey, RHP vs Taijuan Walker, RHP, 8:40 PM CT

Saturday: Jon Lester, LHP vs Patrick Corbin, LHP, 7:10 PM CT

Sunday: Jake Arrieta, RHP vs Zack Godley, RHP, 3:10 PM CT

After this the Cubs have something like three straight weeks against teams with losing records.

Willson Contreras smacked two solo homers bringing his total to 21. His wOBA is up to .369. His ISO is 45 points better than last year.

Jon Lester pitched a good game until running into trouble in the 7th. Prior to the 7th, Lester had 7 Ks through 6 while giving up only 4 baserunners and 1 run.

Um, I guess Jason Heyward? Heyward went 3-4 with a double. He did get picked off in the 6th with Lester at the dish.

Three down:

Someone needs to check on Carl Edwards, Jr. In 3 appearances in August, he's given up 7 runs over 1.2 innings. He's struck out just 1 of the 15 batters he's faced. Watching him pitch, he is grooving pitches right down Main Street or it's not even close to the zone. He's completely lost command.

Joe left Lester in to bat for himself in the bottom of the 6th with runners on 1st and 2nd with 1 out. Heyward was TOOTBLAN'd and Lester struckout. Lester was replaced the next half inning after giving up 3 hits and 2 runs. Joe is still figuring out how to coach a National League team after 2.5+ seasons.

Ian Happ went 1-4 with 2 Ks. He has 1 HR in the last 30 days. His OPS has dropped 60+ points in the same timespan.

Next up: Cubs travel to San Francisco (9:05 pm CST) just in time since I think if they continued to play good team they'd drop to 2nd place in the division. Unfortunately, we will be listening to the ESPN broadcast tonight. Jake Arrieta (3.88 ERA) takes on Matt Moore (5.80 ERA).

Jon Lester picked up his 2000th strikeout and hit his first major league home run. He also singled in this game, which should indicate how well everyone was seeing Dbacks starter Patrick Corbin tonight.

Anthony Rizzo also blasted two home runs, bringing his season total up to 26. He's well on pace to pass the 31-32 home run totals from his last three seasons and is having a quietly great year that is masked by a .242 BABIP. He's cut his strikeout rate by nearly a quarter, and has the best walk rate of his career (technically just below his rookie season in SD), and his ISO is right in line with last year's.

Ian Happ and Javy Baez also went yard in this game. It's kind of funny that the Cubs loaded up on RHBs and then saw both lefties in the lineup hit homers off of the starter.

Three down:

It was not a super efficient start for Lester, to say the least. The tone was set by the double digit pitch PA by the Dbacks leadoff hiter, though at least Lester was able to strike him out.

Despite the home run, Javy was the only Cub to end up with a negative WPA in this game thanks to an inning ending groundout in the first inning mini-rally and a double play in the third.

The Cubs have a much tougher draw tomorrow, and the next week and a half in general. Luckily after that it is a lot of games against teams like the Reds and Mets.

Next up: Zack Godley takes on Jake Arrieta at 7:05 PM CT. I forgot that Godley used to be in the Cubs org – he was sent to AZ in the Montero deal. I remember exactly zero about him, so he must have been a lottery ticket that the Dbacks were lucky enough to hit on.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-16-diamondbacks-4/feed/292Cubs 4, Brewers 2http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-4-brewers-2/
http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-4-brewers-2/#commentsMon, 31 Jul 2017 04:36:24 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20507OSS: Cubs take two of three on the road against their biggest playoff competition, and now lead by four games in the loss column.

Three up:

Ths Cubs scored their first two runs on a two-out rally in the sixth, keyed by a Willson Contreras infield single. As I was listening to it I was thinking that it felt like the kind of inning that has tended to happen *to* the Cubs this year, not the other way around.

Victor Caratini hit his first major league home run to put the Cubs back in the lead. For his sake, at least he got it in before the Cubs traded for another catcher (probably, as I write this).

Lackey coughed up a two run homer just after the Cubs managed to score, but this start definitely exceeded expecations. Lackey's final line was 6 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 BB 7 K. I'll take that out of a fifth starter, at least.

Three down:

It was a very rough night for Ben Zobrist, who struck out three times and was shown so little respect that the Brewers intentionally walked Javier Baez to get to him in the ninth.

Javy's swings were so bad yesterday that they broke the space-time continuum, in order to ensure that they showed up in this recap as well.

Justin Wilson's numbers are pretty good, but given how the Tigers pen has been a dumpster fire for what feels like the last decade it's going to be hard to shake my subconsious wtf at this.

Next up: The Cubs have a day off, then square off with the Dbacks at Wrigley. Lester takes on Patrick Corbin, who I hope I don't call Barry Corbin at some point this week, in the opener.

J-Hey hit a solo shot off of Jared Hughes in the 11th to put the Cubs ahead for good. He's had a pretty good series, hitting a homer in this game and robbing noted crybaby Ryan Braun of another in the first game.

I wouldn't necessarily say Kyle Hendricks looked great, but there were some encouraging signs in this game compared to his first start back from the DL. He didn't walk anyone and his velocity was up, which are Kyle Hendricks related things that one likes to see. The hard hit balls thing, maybe less so.

I was feeling pretty nervous once the Cubs turned things over to the bullpen, but they had a pretty great night. Edwards, Duensing, Strop, Uehara, Monty, and Davis combined for six innings, one hit, five walks, eight strikeouts, and no runs. Less walks would be nice but they got the job done in this one.

Three down:

See above, re: Hendricks and hard hit balls.

Javier Baez had some of the worst plate appearances I have ever seen in this game. If the Cubs had another crdible shortstop around he would be heading to Iowa for to get the same treatment as Schwarber for getting his head on straight.

RIP John Arguello, and Fuck Cancer.

Next up: John Lackey takes on Zach Davies in the rubber match. Davies was a breakout guy last year, but has taken a huge step back in 2017. He is, however, coming off two pretty great starts against the Nats and Pirates, combining for 14.2 IP, 0 ER, 11 K and 4 BB.

ərber had eleven total bases on the day, courtesy of two home runs and a triple that just missed going over the fence. Aside from the fact that he was crushing it in general, it was great to see that two of those shots were to left field. He had been pulling the ball like crazy before his demotion, now he's looking more like the Schwarber of old.

Jon Lester had a solid outing, allowing two solo home runs and five total baserunners in seven innings. Aside from the whole lack of first inning runs thing, it feels like the biggest difference from the first half is that the Cubs starters are going deeper into games again. Well, the good ones at least.

Willson Contreras continues to be white-hot, reaching base three times and scoring twice in this game.

Three down:

Uehara struggled a bit while mopping things up in the ninth, giving up a solo shot to Abreu. He's given up runs (all on homers) in three of his last six outings.

Jon Jay had a rough day on offense, striking out three times and getting hit in the helmet in his only other PA. This was promptly followed up by a TOOTBLAN.

The Cubs don't have four more games against this squad.

Next up: The Cubs head to Wrigley North to face the Brew Crew. It's nice to see this long quasi homestand as a balance to the stretch in June where the Cubs had just three home games in a span of three weeks.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-6-sox-3/feed/186Cubs 8, Sox 3http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-8-sox-3/
http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-8-sox-3/#commentsThu, 27 Jul 2017 05:14:07 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20499OSS: Cubs bats get over their bizarre Big Game James issues, Arrieta has a solid performance, and the Cubs are back in first place.

Three up:

Jake looked pretty good tonight, and his final line was 6.2 IP, 2 H, 2R, 2 BB, 5 K. Obviously Jay Carrieta isn't walking through that door anymore, but this was a solid start. He had great movement on his pitches and was generally around the strike zone. Perkins pointed out in the game thread that Arrieta only throwing ~60% strikes wouldn't cut it against a real MLB team, but that seems kind of normal to me. At least by the eyeball norm, that's roughly what he did in most of his starts in 2015-16 too*.

*While looking up these stats I stumbled across this fangraphs article about "Jacob" Arrieta and Wade Davis. Fun times!

The Cubs hitters started off slowly against Shields, but came through as the game went on. Rizzo had the best day at the plate, going 3-4 with four RsBI including a bases-clearing double that lodged under the tarp at the base of the wall.

Jon Jay made a hell of a catch early in the game, and was pretty good at the plate today too. He reached base three times and drove in a run.

Three down:

Shields still has Bryant's number for some reason, though at least he put two balls in play this time.

Ian Happ was the only Cub not to reach base in this one. Well, sort of. He did reach on a fielders choice that nailed Zobrist at the plate.

He made up for it somewhat with a late homer, but Addison Russell had a rough game up to that point including a bases loaded flyout to end the Cubs first rally against Shields.

Next up: Jon Lester takes on Mike Pelfrey at 7:10 PM CT. If the Cubs win, they get the Crosstown Cup back (assuming the White Sox haven't traded it for some A-ball second baseman). If they lose and split the series, ownership of the cup goes to the electoral college or something.

Willson Contreras might be the best player on this team. He hit another homer, his 7th of July which brought his OPS up to .835. Combining his offense, defense, and rookie contract, I don't think there's a more valuable catcher in the game.

Ben Zobrist is trying to find himself out of a season long slump and went 3-4 with 2 doubles.

Carl Edwards, Jr. was nails taking over for John Lackey with men on 2nd and 3rd in the 5th. He got out of the jam and holding the 2 inherited runners, culiminating with a swinging strikeout to Jose Abreu.

Three Six down:

Cubs hitters struck out 17 (!) times, 11 coming from Carlos Rodon in his 4 innings of work. Yes, of Rodon's 12 outs, 11 came by way of strikeout.

Lance Barksdale has a terrible game behind the plate. His zone was all over the place for both teams. He then didn't issue a warning after Lackey hit his 4th batter of the game in 5 innings and 3rd HBP in a row in the 5th. With no warning issued, Chris Beck retaliated on his second pitch hitting Ian Happ. It took 5 HBP for Barksdale to issue a warning. Of his strike calling duties, his worst came on Bryant's called strike three which culiminated in Bryant getting tossed:

Kris Bryant took home a golden sombrero prior to getting tossed and hitting the showers early. He also took a nasty foul ball off his right knee that kept him down a good 3-4 minutes before being ready to get back in the batter's box.

John Lackey continued doing 2017 John Lackey things. He allowed 11 baserunners in 5+ innings and somehow only gave up 2 runs. He hit 4 batters on the day, including 3 in the 5th alone.

Lackey came up to bat in the bottom of the 5th just after getting out of his bases loaded via HBP jam. There were two runners on with two outs after Rick Renteria intentionally walked Addison Russell. Joe kept Lackey in to hit for himself despite the scoring opportunity and high likelihood that Lackey wouldn't get through the following half inning. Lackey grounded out to end the frame, gave up a single and double and was promptly pulled without recording an out in the 6th. Touche Joe.

Next up: The teams switch sides as the series goes to Guarantee Rate Field (dying laughing) for a two game set. Jake Arrieta takes on James Shields today to see if either pitcher can go back in time to 2015.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-7-white-sox-2/feed/60Crosstown Cup Open Threadhttp://www.obstructedview.net/crosstown-cup-open-thread/
http://www.obstructedview.net/crosstown-cup-open-thread/#commentsMon, 24 Jul 2017 17:50:16 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20482
(note: I have one usable arm at the moment so this is short and sweet)

We have pitchers going against their pitchers. Ours are better

We have hitters, as do the White Sox. Ours are pretty good and theirs suck

Jon Lester was fantastic today, taking a perfect game into the sixth until Wainwright poked a single through the left side to break it up. He continued to cruise until he ran out of steam in the eighth, giving up back to back solo shots to Grichuk and DeJong*, but an amazing start nonetheless. His final line on the day was 8 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 0 BB, 10 SO.

Bionic Human Kris Bryant was the WPA leader on the day, somehow notching two hits when most folks though he would not even play this weekend. Zobryzzo combined for all three of the Cubs runs batted in during their late rally. Matheny took a page from Joe's playbook when he let Wainwright bat for himself in the eighth.

Rizzo had the other big hit of the day in what was a quiet day for both offenses. It is great to see him getting XBHs against lefties again.

Three down:

Wainwright has had a rough year, but his curveball was wicked tonight. All the Cubs had issues with it, but it felt like Kyle Schwarber felt it the most. Though he only struck out once. In fact somehow the Cubs only struck out three times in this game.

Wade Davis made things a little more ineteresting than anyone would have liked, walking two batters before getting the final out.

The Cubs could have blown things open even more in the eighth, but Joe put on a strange double steal with Schwarber at the plate, maybe hoping that with a base open the Cardinals would want to walk War Bear in the middle of a lefty on lefty matchup? I'm not so sure of that logic. But still, it was a strange move.

Next up: Jose Qunitana takes on Michael Wacha on Sunday Night Baseball. Quintana was great in his last outing, here's hoping for another one.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-3-cardinals-2/feed/121Series Preview: St. Louis Cardinals (46-49) at Chicago Cubs (49-45)http://www.obstructedview.net/series-preview-st-louis-cardinals-46-49-at-chicago-cubs-49-45/
http://www.obstructedview.net/series-preview-st-louis-cardinals-46-49-at-chicago-cubs-49-45/#commentsFri, 21 Jul 2017 05:48:05 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20477
If the 2016 Cubs truly are back, it's hard to think of a better litmus test than a home series against the Cardinals. Of course, the Cardinals have been disappointing relative to non-BP expectations as well this year. The main thing that has taken a step back is their offense, which trailed only the Cubs in wRC+ among NL teams last year but now ranks ninth in the league. They were a dumpster fire defensively earlier in the season but appear to have righted the ship, posting 15.6 runs above average with the gloves. This may sound good, but it's actually fourth worst in the NL, where every team but the Padres has a positive defensive number somehow. I guess all the shitty defenders are in the AL, where negative defensive units thrive.

Martinez has bounced back from a relatively disappointing 2016 that saw a significant drop in his strikeout rate. This year, however, he has set a career high. It's come with siginificantly more balls going over the fence, but that could be said of pretty much any pitcher this year.

Arrieta has had a trio of good to great outings following a disaster start in DC. I'm going to need a lot more starts to be as convinved that he might have turned a corner as others around the Cubs o sphere.

I have some sort of weird revese bias against Waino. I remember him getting off to a bad start to the year, but remember a good start or two since and just assumed that he had righted the ship. But here we are in late July and he still has a 5+ ERA. Having two nine run outings in June will do that for you.

Speaking of nine-ish run outings, Lester bounced back well from his disaster of a pre-ASB start with a solid outing vs the Barves, allowing just one run on three hits and a walk in seven innings.

Wacha is coming off a complete game shutout of the Mets, so maybe he will be a little gassed. Not that shutting down the Mets 'offense' is a relatively impressive accomplishment these days.

Quintana, of course, had one of the best starts of any pitcher, Cubs or otherwise, in his last outing. He struck out 12 with no walks or runs, allowing just three hits over seven innings. I can't think of many better Cubs debuts.

Lester was great tonight, which is especially nice to see after the play about pieces of feces that was his last start before the break. Lester gave up just three hits with one walk and six strikeouts in seven innings, and was cruising along well enough that he probably could have gone out for another inning. He also had a great day at the plate, just missing a home run in his first PA, drawing a four-pitch walk in his final PA, and even gathering his first career stolen base.

Rizzo remains hot at the plate – his 23rd home run of the season was a laser beam to CF. He also added a walk and a single on the night.

The next highest by WPA was Addison Russell, who had a big pinch hit double in the eighth that ended up being the winning run.

Three down:

It was not a great night for Wade Davis to say the least. He gave up three hits, two walks, a wild pitch, and nearly the game.

The Cubs had Teheran on the ropes for much of the middle innings but failed to cash in on a lot of the RISP situations. Kyle Schwarber in particular had the lowest WPA on the day for the Cubs players.

John Lackey pitches tomorrow.

Next up: John Lackey takes on rookie Sean Newcomb, the Braves first round pick in 2014. He’s made six starts this year and has been relatively solid, though the projection systems have him pegged to walk 5-6 batters per nine instead of his current MLB number of 3.98.

Addison Muscle hit a go-ahead homer in the top of the ninth to put the Cubs over the top in this strange game. Russell led the Cubs in WPA on the day, largely due to that shot.

It was one of five on the day by Cubs hitters, including a meaningless-seeming (at the time) shot by Heyward, a two run bomb by Zobrist, and back-to-back shots by Contreras and Schwarber.

Wade Davis (and I guess Duensing) did a pretty good job of cleaning up the mess that the rest of the staff left them. They were the lone bright spots on a pretty awful day for the pen.

Three down:

Woof, the bullpen. they allowed 4-6 runs to score (depending on how you feel about inherited runners) over 3 2/3 innings, and it somehow felt like they should have given up more. Good thing you were well rested, fellas.

It was not the greatest day for Monty, either, though I guess you can cut him a little slack for wanting to pitch more to contact while pitching with an eight run lead. He gave up two ground rule doubles in the same game, which is one of the weirder stats you'll see.

Despite the Cubs teeing off on Gausman, Bryant and Baez managed to go 0-9 between them with four strikeouts. Three were Javy's, but you'd expect Bryant to be a guy to really go off on a hitters' night like this was.

Next up: Wade Miley takes on Jake Arrieta in his return to Camden Yards. Miley has been a walk machine this year, so hopefully the Cubs keep their bats on their shoulders more than they did today (2 walks).

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-9-os-8-7-14-17/feed/177Cubs Acquire Jose Quintana for Dylan Cease, Eloy Jimenez (++)http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-acquire-jose-quintana-for-dylan-cease-eloy-jimenez/
http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-acquire-jose-quintana-for-dylan-cease-eloy-jimenez/#commentsThu, 13 Jul 2017 16:59:27 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20467
In a blockbuster opening salvo to the 2017 trading season, the Cubs landed one of the best gettable arms for this cycle.

First, let's talk about what we've lost. Eloy Jimenez is a hell of a prospect (No. 5 in BA's midseason ranking). He has light-tower power, though it hasn't translated onto the field at quite the same rate. He's still very young with a few years of seasoning left in the minors, and he has as good a shot as anyone currently in the minors to be a .300/.400/.500 guy. He's a nice fit in the AL, as well, as he could easily be a DH when it's all said and done.

Dylan Cease was sort of my pet prospect, with a 98 MPH fastball that he can throw for strikes and a curveball that wipes hitters out. He has the same injury problems that most hard throwers have, but he could quickly become a frontline starter for the White Sox.

That said, Jose Quintana is already one of those. After a rough start to the year, Quintana has been what he's always been, and that's an extremely efficient and good starter. Over the past 3.5 years, Lester and Quintana have identical fWAR (16.6, good for 7th in MLB). Quintana isn't an overpowering pitcher, but he locates the ball extremely well and is very consistent. The only worry is that he isn't as grounder-dominant as a traditional frontline guy is (so a juiced ball might adversely affect him).

Quintana is under team control until 2021, so this is as much a play for 2018 as it is for 2017. It swings the pendulum away from "sell" to "hold," mostly because the Cubs simply don't have tradeable assets in the minors anymore. Still, I really like this trade (more for next year than this one), and I imagine that White Sox fans should like it too.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-acquire-jose-quintana-for-dylan-cease-eloy-jimenez/feed/32Where We Stand Nowhttp://www.obstructedview.net/where-we-stand-now-2/
http://www.obstructedview.net/where-we-stand-now-2/#commentsWed, 12 Jul 2017 04:28:10 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20461
I'm bringing back this feature from the olden days…if only because we need a new post. I'm stealing this format mostly from the 2015 version of this post, which credits shawndgoldman for the original regular feature.

Record: 43-45, 5.5 games back of the Brewers and tied with the Cardinals for second place in this shitshow of a division.

The actual record is what’s most important, but runs scored and runs allowed often reflect a team’s actual talent better and do a better job at predicting rest of season wins.

Thankfully for those like me who are lazy, Baseball Prospectus calculates a few different winning percentages.

1st Order Winning Percentage is the team’s Pythagorean record. It’s based on actual runs scored and allowed.

The Cubs 1st Order Winning Percentage is .500. They’ve scored 399 runs and allowed 399 runs. That’s a 44-44 record. The Brewers are at the top at .550, 5 games ahead of the Cubs. The Cardinals also have a better win percentage than the Cubs, at .515 and 1.5 games up.

2nd Order Winning Percentage is based on projected runs scored and allowed. The projected totals are based on the team’s underlying stats. It’s an attempt to rid the team of any good or bad luck runs that may have scored by them or their opponent.

The Cubs 2nd Order Winning Percentage is .532, which is good for a 47-41 record, which is the best in the division by this metric. The Cardinals are right behind at .527 and the Brewers are at .510, showing that BP still has a little skepticism there. But wins in the bank are wins in the bank.

3rd Order Winning Percentage is like the previous one, but it adjusts for quality of the team’s opponents, home park, and league difficulty.

This one is the most thorough of the three and the Cubs fare the second best here at .533. The Cardinals are at .538, just ahead of the Cubs, and the Brewers are at .503.

Baseball Prospectus’ Playoff Odds Report uses the current record and rest of season PECOTA projections to calculate the team’s record at the end of the year. The Cubs finish at 83.3 wins while the Brewers win 84.8 and the Cardinals 81.3. Yeesh. More importantly, the simulations currently give the Cubs a 31% chance of winning the division (let's not kid ourselves with the wild card for any of these teams). The Brewers are at 47.6% and the Cards are at 16.5%. To be honest, despite the Brewers lead, after seeing these numbers I'm most worried about the Cardinals because Cardinals.

538's Playoff projector has the Cubs pegged at 83 wins and a 38% chance to make the playoffs.

There's not a lot to love in the stats for this year other than Bryant being Bryant. The FO has pretty much signaled that they are standing pat, though I would not be surprised to see them flip a relatively big name (not named Bryzzo) for a cost-controlled arm if they find the right deal. Last year's stats still exist too, and there's plenty of reason to believe in positive regression at least on the position player side. The pitching I am much less sanguine about. They might take a page from the Yankees and trade Davis, but it's not like the Cubs have Dellin Betances hanging around like the Yankees did. As much as I like Edwards, I don't know if that's where you want to hang your hat. Maybe they can get something better from the comp pick, assuming I still remember how the CBA works.

We'd be remiss without mentioning the fact that Montero hit a grandslam in Game 6 on the NLCS, and that he hit the go-ahead-by-2 RBI in Game 7 of the World Series (which the Cubs won. the Cubs won the World Series). He's also been a very solid hitter for the Cubs in part-time duty this year. It's obvious to everyone that he wants to start somewhere, doesn't get along with Joe Maddon, and now didn't get along with pitchers or Rizzo. He also threw out 0 of 31 basestealers this year, which is Myles-esque.

Victor Caratini is very worthy of the shot. He's hit at every level, carrying a .343/.384/.539 line into today's games with Iowa. I'd expect him to walk a little (though below average), strike out at an average clip, and have a little bit of power. A solid option for a backup catcher (and he's a switch-hitter, which is a nice bonus).

The James Russell/Emilio Bonifacio trade just continues to pay dividends.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/cubs-dfa-miguel-montero-call-up-victor-caratini/feed/113The Case for Sellinghttp://www.obstructedview.net/the-case-for-selling/
http://www.obstructedview.net/the-case-for-selling/#commentsWed, 28 Jun 2017 13:39:36 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20448
Let's get one thing out of the way first: the Cubs won the 2016 World Series. I bring that up for 2 reasons. First, that's awesome and I want to bring it up at every opportunity. The other reason is that it buys you a significant amount of runway to do whatever you want for the near future.

I'm not exactly sure why, but the Cubs are not good this year. At their current pace, they are an 83-win team, and they haven't given any indication that they are going to hit above their weight from July forward. There are some injuries, some demotions, and the return of the suck for the pitching staff. Compounding these woes, the farm team isn't what it used to be, and it's going to need to produce pitching at a pretty high clip going forward (or else the Cubs are going to have to pull some FA/trade magic). Next year, John Lackey and Jake Arrieta are both free agents; the former is cooked and the latter is one of the biggest FA question marks of the past decade.

Those aren't the only 2018 FAs, either. We'll lose our 4th OF (John Jay), our backup C/starting malcontent (M. Montero), and our best and 3rd best relievers (Davis and Uehara). All told, the Cubs are shedding $55 million in payroll next year, but go into next season with Kyle Hendricks as the ace, an aging/deteriorating Jon Lester as the #2, and Mike Montgomery as the #3. Anyone's guess after that.

I believe the Cubs should be selling off parts this year. The path to the NL Central is achievable, of course, and once you get there anything is possible. The problem there is that you'd probably have to BUY to get there, and that would be very irresponsible unless you're buying long-term assets at the deadline (and those are expensive). A team will pay something from Jake Arrieta, maybe even something good. A team will take on the rest of John Lackey's $16 MM payroll (prorated at the deadline, approx. $7 MM in cash savings). Don't laugh, it's true – someone would trade for John Lackey at the deadline. You'd get absolutely nothing but salary relief in return, but $7 million is not nothing when you need every dollar you can muster to sign Bryce Harper. Asshole antics aside, Miguel Montero could start at catcher for some team looking to improve at the deadline (probably an AL team that can stash him at DH a not-insignificant part of the time). Wade Davis would command a HUGE prospect haul – you could probably get more for him than you paid to acquire him. Koji Uehara would bring back something fairly interesting (a back of the top-10 in the org type). There's even a small (really small) chance that you could unload Zobrist, though that would be a salary dump in the same vein as Lackey.

If you could successfully unload all of these assets, you'd save $30 million dollars and you'd probably get a top-20 in the minors prospect and a pair of top-200 guys. That's 1/3 to 2/5 of an Alex Cobb contract, and perhaps a starting pitching prospect that you can slot into the back end of your rotation. When the price of that is the 5% or so of a WS you forgo by selling, it seems to be a no-brainer.

The counter-argument takes two forms. The first is that you might want to re-sign some of these players in free agency. If that's the case, go ahead and keep them (except Wade Davis – the Cubs should definitely sell Wade Davis is they sell anything at the deadline). The other argument is that the Cubs are a 13-3 run away from being 5 games up and looking like buyers at the deadline. My response to that is which 16-game stretch in the first 70 games of the season led you to believe that this team is at all likely to do that? The Cubs are a beast with 6 gaping bullet wounds (LF, RF, SP1, SP2, SS, RP). Why would sell a piece of 2018 or 2019 to buy a single band-aid?

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/the-case-for-selling/feed/49What’s up with Kyle Freeland?http://www.obstructedview.net/whats-up-with-kyle-freeland/
http://www.obstructedview.net/whats-up-with-kyle-freeland/#commentsMon, 26 Jun 2017 18:23:05 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20444
As the 108th most influential Cubs blog, we have a sworn duty to stay in our lane and only give you the highest quality of Cubs analysis. However, I just can't get over Kyle Freeland for some reason. Yes, he's not on the Cubs, and yes, he only played the Cubs once (game score of exactly 50). What's interesting to Kyle Freeland is that he is seemingly the best case scenario of every Cubs pitcher of the last generation: that is, he doesn't ever strike anyone out.

The league is striking out more and more frequently. The league is walking more and more frequently. The league is homering more and more frequently. Kyle Freeland, however, stands out in stark contrast to this trend.

Name

Team

TTO%

Ty Blach

Giants

17.99%

Ivan Nova

Pirates

19.79%

Jeremy Hellickson

Phillies

22.60%

Miguel Gonzalez

White Sox

24.01%

Josh Tomlin

Indians

24.15%

Mike Leake

Cardinals

24.58%

Kyle Freeland

Rockies

25.24%

Matt Cain

Giants

25.34%

Zach Davies

Brewers

25.59%

Clayton Richard

Padres

25.61%

Freeland doesn't lead the league in No True Outcomes percentage (though he's pretty close). He walks too many people for that to be the case (9.1% of PAs end in a walk). The interesting thing about Freeland in this regard is that he plays half of his games in Coors Field, which is a notorious launching pad for hitters. Freeland gets around this by inducing an obscene amount of groundballs:

Name

Team

BABIP

GB/FB

LD%

GB%

FB%

Lance McCullers

Astros

0.281

3.23

17.50%

63.00%

19.50%

Marcus Stroman

Blue Jays

0.316

2.61

16.60%

60.30%

23.10%

Clayton Richard

Padres

0.341

2.95

21.70%

58.50%

19.80%

Kyle Freeland

Rockies

0.299

2.39

17.00%

58.50%

24.50%

Tyler Chatwood

Rockies

0.259

2.44

20.10%

56.70%

23.20%

Luis Severino

Yankees

0.275

2

15.80%

56.10%

28.10%

Jaime Garcia

Braves

0.272

2.09

17.60%

55.70%

26.70%

Mike Leake

Cardinals

0.264

2.29

21.00%

55.00%

24.00%

Jhoulys Chacin

Padres

0.293

1.8

16.90%

53.40%

29.70%

Wade Miley

Orioles

0.324

2.07

21.40%

53.00%

25.60%

That's generally good company to be in. The easiest way to get by without striking people out is to prevent balls from going in the air; that's doubly important when playing in Coors Field. Put together, he actually pitches better at Coors than on the road (.712 opposing OPS home, .817 away). While groundballs result in hits more often than flyballs, flyballs go for home runs at an ever increasing rate (a combination of a juiced ball and more athletic hitters). Freeland, to this point, is showing the way to be successful despite the obvious deficiencies in a put-away pitch (which he'll likely never have).

In an attempt to bring this into at least quasi-relevance for the Cubs, I think this underscores the importance to limiting flyballs in particular. While it's true that pitchers only have limited control over their batted-ball profiles, it's self-evident that they can influence it somewhat – if they couldn't, there would be no variation from pitcher to pitcher. Pitchers like John Lackey are almost entirely useless simply on the basis of the fact they allow too many flyballs – even yesterday, it was clear to see that Montgomery allowed a home run to Stanton that was a double any year before 2015 or to any other hitter besides Stanton. The rules of the game are changing, and changing quickly. The pitching staff needs to be aware of that, and they need to make changes in approach if at all possible. There's at least some viable path forward if you can induce groundballs and reduce flyballs – at least there is until Freeland regresses to the mean.

]]>http://www.obstructedview.net/whats-up-with-kyle-freeland/feed/157Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (38-37) at Washington Nationals (45-30)http://www.obstructedview.net/series-preview-chicago-cubs-38-37-at-washington-nationals-45-30/
http://www.obstructedview.net/series-preview-chicago-cubs-38-37-at-washington-nationals-45-30/#commentsMon, 26 Jun 2017 05:21:41 +0000http://www.obstructedview.net/?p=20440
The Cubs are in the middle of a brutal scheduling stretch that has just three home games in a span of three weeks. At least the Nationals are only the penultimate team during this stretch, rather than the capper. Who the hell schedules back to back four game road series like this? Good job, good effort, MLB. Though it's not like the Cubs prospects would look so good going into this even if they had a week off beforehand.